


Walls

by SHudson



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merlin, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, London, London Underground, M/M, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-17
Updated: 2013-02-10
Packaged: 2017-11-25 21:30:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/643162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SHudson/pseuds/SHudson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Modern non-magic AU. In the midst of dark times, recession forces free-thinking Merlin to move to London to live with his uncle in while he hunts for work. Meeting Arthur was never part of his plan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

The wallpaper in the corridor running up to the converted attic was torn at the join of one sheet to the next, the dull cream of the paper scar yellowed with the length of time it had been exposed. The stenciled roses were ripped in two almost up to the height of his hip now. He remembered the incident with the bright yellow and red plastic storage boxes as toboggans. He and Will had dreamt that up. And how, afterwards, he'd tried to glue the torn flap back with PVA. His Mum has boxed his ears and called him stupid, cried and shouted at him: didn't he understand, did he really think she could get it all done again while she was doing Mrs Tiverton's book keeping and bloody bootsales just to pay the bills; did he really think it would be the same? She and Dad had put that wallpaper up together and now it was ruined, wasn't it? No one was going to magic it back together.

It wasn't often she got upset about possessions, things, so when she did he knew it was serious.

Merlin bit his lip, letting his head sink into his hands. A funny time to remember how much that had hurt her all those years ago. Long fingers teased into his dark hair that was, according to the career guidance woman at school, just a little too long and his grip tightened in a tug that was satisfyingly painful, even though the ache was dull. All those years since, trying to be good for her, and now he'd managed to mess it up again.

"Ours is a small village and he is so clearly... at _odds_ with people here, and I..."

She was trying to whisper, he knew she was, but the house was quiet - it would be, in the middle of the day when most people in the street had gone to work or school - and her voice was floating up to him, as clearly as it used to when he listened in on his parents rowing. Before his dad... well. It was just the two of them now. He could hear the emotion in the hitch as her words faltered and the volume faded out.

  
"...just not the right place for him anymore... No... Yes, I know..."

The blue-eyed teen scuffed at the worn down stair carpet with his rubber soled shoes, hoping for static. Part of him didn't want to hear. He'd drawn a butterfly by his ankle in thick, dark lines of biro. It wasn't going anywhere either.

Almost hopeful, his smile hitched up, remembering when he was little someone taking him somewhere with a Van De Graff generator and his thick, dark hair standing end on end. Perhaps he could just float away like a helium-filled baloon. He jittered his teeth together, ignoring the hitch of her voice that let him know his mother was upset, and the words that she wasn't saying that he could still hear. He'd known for years that he didn't fit in around here. Not really. The seal on his tennis shoes was coming away where it met the fabric. On days like this it felt like his sanity was deviating too.

At the end of the garden the lunchtime express train jolted past, rattling the windows all along the terrace. Mrs Granger's dog set off barking, like it always did. She turned her television up in retaliation and Merlin could hear the drone of her favourite soap all the way up here from her front room next door. She always turned it down again for the news, but Merlin could always hear the reporter whispering away about the recession hitting. Double dip and highest unemployment numbers in living memory, redundencies in the papers, companies going under, national chains closing down, or thinning out branch numbers, empty shop windows in the high street, until he wanted to press his hands against his ears and scream at the walls for them to all shut up.

He knew what it all meant well enough.

"Every mother wants her son to be special, don't they? Gifted in some way. And he is - so much so that sometimes... sometimes I wish that he wasn't. That he could just... _settle_ with something."

He shouldn't have told the woman at the Job Centre that he wanted to be a rent boy, with such a totally straight face; shouldn't have said that male stripper would do as well, if she couldn't line that gig up. _It worked in Yorkshire, didn't it? Full Monty and all that. Maybe I could suck dick on the side._

"I'm afraid for him Gaius."

He knew that wasn't an appropriate joke to make. Not here. But he'd been going for interviews for three months with no luck since the council closed the library he used to work at, and the reality of being unemployed and stuck here for perpetuity was too heavy, too depressing. He couldn't take it. What did he have to look forward to? Maybe another in-fill job for a week and a half covering Bethany Mills, answering the telephone and typing out letters while she was off sick having her tonsils out. Another week of standing in the bus queue with that twat from the council estate pulling at his jacket and prodding at his packed lunch and calling him a poof because of it, as though that made any sense at all. _Oooh Mummy made him sandwiches!_

And then what? Nothing.

He felt so guilty that normal wasn't enough for him, that his gut burned with the need for more, to be great or extraordinary like he knew he could be, because he knew it caused her so much trouble. He should have just been satisfied, like Will, to have any job that was going. And he would be, really he would be, if only he could get past the interviews without them realising his smile was fake and his answers had tinged themselves with sarcasm while he described why he was the perfect fit for whatever it was that day, that had suddenly always been his career aim. He wasn't a good liar; that had always been the problem. The sparkle in his eyes died, and his face... his face gave him away.

_You are who you are and the worst thing you could ever do to yourself is to try to be something else to make someone else happy._

His father had said that to him when he was small. He knew his mother believed that too, even when she looked him dead in the eye and told him that he had to be sensible now, had to think about a job that would pay the bills. Eighteen was time to grow up a little, put away dreams. Just for now, Merlin, please. Just until you have something to support yourself.

By nineteen he should have been comfortable with pressing it all down, but he wasn't. Mostly he felt trapped; sometimes he felt sick.

But he wanted the village to stop with their whispers, their "Poor Mrs Emrys. She tries so hard with that boy," and their looks as though he'd ever been anything other than polite and smiled. It wasn't fair on her, but now he knew he'd only made it worse.

"Did you hear? Merlin Emrys. To think he's been chasing after that poor Will boy for years. And them running around naked together as kids. Can you imagine it? Of course, we always suspected something..."

Because they always did and they always would. Because his mother dressed in linen and wore her hair long and braided and looked like she'd stepped out of a painting by Botticelli, and wore espadrilles and wooden clogs and canvas boat shoes rather than anything leather. And sat on the green in the sun when the rest of the village was in church. And hadn't been married to his father.

His father. The man who was a scant collection of rose-tinted memories that fuelled a childhood of playing out in the woods and coming back with scraped shins from climbing trees and grazes on the palms of his hands from skidding down slopes, rather than getting eye strain squinting at computer games; who prompted him to hole up in his room and read anything he could get his hands on, cover to cover until the local library had nothing left to offer, because he wanted to be nauralist too. Wanted to travel to far corners of the globe to protect the African Elephant, or the Bonobo chimps.

Instead he had stick insects, badger sets and hundred year old oak trees.

He hadn't studied anything at all after his A Levels, because they didn't have the money and it wasn't fair to put some stupid, airhead dream ahead of the realities of helping his mum with the mortgage payments and trying to stop another thread of gray weaving its way into her dark hair. His father had flitted off; he knew it upset his Mum when he'd talked of wanting to do the same. So, fresh out of school he'd taken on typing jobs and gardening jobs, then stumbled into a more permanent role at the library where he'd worked his Saturdays when he was sixteen, because they didn't care about the tattoo on the inside of his wrist, or his tendency to day dream, or the fact that he'd chained himself to a tree to and got himself arrested when they tried to route the bypass through the local common. But this year the council had done what it had been threatening for years and cut funding, and their small library was closed.

Will had said he'd try to get him a job at the supermarket he worked at, if anything came up. But that hadn't materialized and now he doubted it was going to. Not after... Well. That was another low point to add to everything else. This was possibly the worst week of his life.

And now his mother was on the phone to Uncle Gai, who she only ever called at Christmas, who he'd never even met and he knew what was going to come next.

He heard his mother make her goodbyes, heard the rattle of the receiver being placed back on the hook, the gush of the tap and the flick of the kettle switch, the chink of two mugs; his mind supplied the soft hush of a teabag being pushed into each that he couldn't hear from all the way up here. He let his eyes sink closed and his head rested against the wall, his ear pinking at the pressure of being trapped beneath the weight of his head and his thoughts and blatent inevitability.

"Merlin luv!"

He heard her step into the corridor and could picture her standing there, one hand on the newel post as she looked up the stairs out of habit, even though with the first twist at the top of the flight, and the fact that these steps were on an altogether separate run, they wouldn't see each other.

"Yes Mum!"

"Come down here a minute, pet. We need to talk about...today."

Merlin took a deep breath and heaved himself to his feet. "Yes Mum." His steps were leaden as he plodded downstairs, but he still gave her a smile, because she looked upset, she looked like she was betraying him. Part of him thought so too, but he squashed it down as he wrapped her up in a solid hug.

"I'm sorry."

"Oh psh. The old bat had it coming. Don't be silly... just..."

Merlin shook his head. "I love you Mum."

"Will you let me speak, you daft boy? Whatever was that for?"

He shrugged her question off on a fading smile, with eyes that shied to the side, then gleamed at her full on. "Nothing."

Hunith let out a long, slow sigh. "Oh Merlin..."

His world changed with a whisper; they called it growing up.


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Merlin meets Arthur.

He'd been to Bodmin before. That was where most of the people in his class, himself and Will included, had gone to sixth form college; their weren't many other options. Fowey College kicked you out at 16. Bodmin was a coaching town - village houses along the main street - all old and cottagey - the place wasn't all that big. You could pretty much walk from one end of to very the other in your lunch break; you weren't too far from country lanes and fields, but it had still felt a little closed-in to Merlin. It was tight to make it back again if you strolled, but the houses out towards the edge and down towards the station really didn't count as the main town so much as the outlying villages. Even Merlin knew that was stretching the definition of the town limits slightly. He'd gone there to catch the London train, and by the end of his journey, his idea of a large had altered permanently.

The stretch across the moor was the last sight of desolate nature he knew he'd have for a while, and that made something in his chest ache. London, on the television, was too many houses too close together and lots of angry people, or rich ones conning each other out of cash. He knew all of that, but he hadn't been prepared for what awaited him.

Standing in the middle of London Waterloo Station at quarter past five, Merlin tried to ward off a panic attack at being in the middle of so many people, all crammed into one place. He'd never seen so many bodies in his entire life. His head spun with shouting out about evening papers in the same rolling tones of East End market scenes on the telly, train announcements about departures on Platform Twelve. Delays, cancellations. Unattended bags. Security alerts. But mostly he could hear the tramp of feet on the concrete. Knuckles whitened, fingers clenched tightly around the strap of his holdall in case someone tried to yank it away from him even though he'd never worried about being mugged before, ever in his life. They were all moving, like a unified conscious stream that branched off in a million different directions of stressed in a pace so fast it made him feel chased. And he was invisible; he had to be - no one had looked at him, not once did anyone meet his eye, but they kept walking into him, kept shoving at his holdall that was so stuffed full of books he was having trouble keeping it hefted up on his shoulder, ramming him out of the way so that every word out of his mouth was 'sorry' and he wanted to either turn sideways and shrink, or face up to one of the suited zombies and hit them in the face.

He gritted his teeth and let that urge pass.

Hunith wouldn't thank him if his first meeting with Uncle Gai also involved the police. But gods, he'd never felt so ant-like in all of his life. The rubber of his tennis shoes squeaked on the coffee-splattered, polished concrete floor as yet another person shoved past and he spun around to avoid the collision, hoping he didn't take anyone out with the rucksack on his shoulders in which he'd stuffed all of his important things like tickets. There was a pigeon up in the rafters, and another over by a row of empty benches - somehow he could hear them cooing through the general din - and Merlin wondered how they'd got in. Did they think this place was crazy too? How the hell did they manager to survive?

Swallowing his panic, he forced himself to make it over towards the entrance of the underground through the crowd. Merlin dodged determined commuters in highly shined shoes and heels as they pushed past him, rushing for their trains home. The few hundred yards left him exhausted, drained of energy and sapped of the will to smile. Fighting against the general flow, he made it down the humming, stuttering escalators. People in electronic posters all the way down smiled at him, advertising 150 years of the London Underground; he felt like he'd detoured into Harry Potter as he spilled onto the crowded platform. Maybe the portraits would wander off, and the staircases would shift and he'd wake up back in his room in the attic and all of this wouldn't be so bad.

The flow of people in the corridors was fast-paced, but it slowed gradually towards the end, and Merlin ground to a halt, confused about the sudden bottle-neck of a queue that had seemed to form from nowhere.

A guy in plastic rimmed glasses shoved past him, picking his way between a sea of people coming the other way, knocking him close to the platform edge that he only realised was there as he stumbled. Forced out of his daydream and nearly into the back of a Japanese tourist, Merlin's heart hammered in his chest. Vertigo swayed him as he looked down at the grime-caked tracks, and he saw a dart of motion. Soot coloured mice darted underneath blackened ceramic insulating plates that reminded him getting electrocuted was probably more of a danger than getting squashed by a train, should he fall down there.

He barely caught his balance but when he did, Merlin shrank back from the edge, forcing back through the crowd to the curved, tiled tunnel wall. Wide eyes watched the flow of people jostling each other out of the way, vieing for the first spot where the train doors opened. Merlin tugged the tube map out of his pocket, and tried to calculate a way of avoiding doing this. He stood there, unwilling to move as tube train after tube train rattled into the station with a gust of uncomfortably hot, thick, wretched air that felt almost solid to breathe in. It smelled horrific. Dirty, metallic, wrong - so thick that he could taste it. And he was breathing it in and it was all over his skin, and he was going to have such a long, hot shower when he got to Gai's place just to feel clean again. Why hadn't he bought a map? If he'd had a sodding A-Z he could walk and avoid doing this. Avoid being one of those people physically bursting out onto the platform as the doors opened and more jostled their way on so that each carriage was packed so densely it reminded him of seeing seeing a dozen clowns tumble out of a mini at the circus when he was small. Except there was no trick here. People's faces were pressed to the glass and everyone was crammed so tightly together that any sense of personal space was null and void.

But he didn't have a map. This tube train was the only way he knew to get to the station Uncle Gai had told him to come to.

It took him a full ten minutes to work up to the idea that he was going to do what everyone else seemed to be doing, and cram himself onto one of these trains, along with his bags, and no sense of remorse about squashing the other passengers, or he was never going to get anywhere. The crowds showed no signs of dissipating. It seemed ridiculous. How could people do this every day?

When he did squeeze his way into a carriage, thick with apologies and cheeks hot with embarrassment as he hefted his holdall up on end and tried to compresss himself against it so as not to take up double room, rucksack stuffed between his feet. He stood there right by the door, neck crained to the curve of the train, peering out as the stations flashed past, worried about missing his stop and being stuck in this human sardine tin all night. The space he was taking up with his bag left him rammed into some guy's arm pit and had a face full of a smartly dressed woman's cleavage and an older guy's elbow in his ribs and newspaper corner in his ear and he couldn't move an inch let alone bend down to pick up his rucksack where he'd set it between his feet when the train screeched into each station. Hell, he could barely breathe out all of the way, his ribs were so compacted. When the lights stuttered out for ten seconds in one of the tunnels, and the train shuddered to a stop, Merlin half convinced himself he was going to die.

And then the gears changed and the train jolted back into life, throwing Merlin awkwardly off his balance and into the woman with the clevage. "Oh gosh, sorry!"

As soon as they pulled into the brightness of the next station, Merlin stepped off the train to let the other passengers push their way off, happy for the few seconds grace away from the lady he'd all but groped; thankfully she pushed her way past him, gathering her bag up onto her shoulder as she hurried off down the platform with a narrow-eyed glare in his direction. Wonderful. He loved this city already. A few commuters pushed back onto the train ahead of him, and Merlin gave a weary sigh. He was the last one to get back on board, and there was barely room again.

Over the intercom the guard's patter began, "Stand clear of the closing doors," just as it had at every other station they'd been through and Merlin grabbed the hand rail to heave himself back into the crush next to his bag before the doors slid closed and found himself shoved out of the way.

Broad shoulders, a briefcase to his gut and God knows where he'd come from, but he was squeezing himself into Merlin's space! 

A shock of blonde hair topped the olive-skinned features. Merlin itched with instant dislike at the arrogant tilt to his nose, and spill to his lips, dull blue eyes that barely registered his presence - Merlin couldn't believe him! 

"Uh.. excuse me! That's _my_ space."

Merlin shouldered into the doorway and the doors attempted to close against him, squashing his shoulders and beeping in frustration as they hissed open again. His bag was on this train. He had to get on board!

" _Stand clear of the closing doors_!"

"Just get off the train, you're holding us all up." The blonde guy was sneering at him, all posh-voiced and sulky pout, and stupid teeth ( _inbred overbite,_ Merlin thought slightly cruelly) as though he was stupid, as though Merlin was the one causing the problem. 

"Listen mate, I was standing right there! That's my space. You're the one who needs to get off the train!" Merlin was livid. The second attempt the door made to close on him didn't help a jot.

  
The business man rolled his eyes. "Oh what are you going to do? Wait for the next one." And before he realised what was happening, he'd shoved Merlin forcibly backwards. Instinct made him grab for something to hold on to and his grip tightened on the corners of his leather briefcase. His feet were half off the edge, but no way was he giving ground. The business man tugged back and Merin pushed forwards, trying to get a better foot hold. 

"Let go of my bag!"

How dare he? How dare this utter dick, in this stupid city? The sneer was what did it - in all his years Merlin had been laughed at, picked on and even threatened in his home town, he had never been looked at like he was nothing, like he was a piece of dirt stuck to the sole of someone's shoe.

"Get off the train!" Merlin growled, anger rising at the injustice of this, the horribleness of this city, the fact that he didn't want to be here, that this had to be the worst place on Earth. Merlin tugged harder.

"Now listen here..." Oh, the posh git was worried now, wasn't he? One hand clamped down on Merlin's shoulder pushing him back, the other closing around the handle of the briefcase and all the while the driver announced the necessity of them both standing clear. "That's Italian leather you absolute pleb!"

His plan was clear - chuck the bag off the train and the guy was sure to follow, but of course it didn't happen like that. Merlin tugged harder - one clean yank and some how he wrenched the bag free. He stumbled back as the bag prized free and the doors that had been pressing against his shoulders snapped shut in front of his nose. He only just caught himself before he hit the floor, with an inelegant stagger hands wild to catch his fall, the briefcase slapping down loudly against the solid platform floor. He'd won!

Triumph dissolved into a look of absolute horror as the train jerked and began to pull out of the station.

The blond's eyes widened into a similar expression; the colour drained from his smug countenance. Through the glass Merlin saw him hit the side of the door, where the buttons to open the door were no more effective than they ever had been. One finger lifted, pointing fiercely and Merlin could read fury on the blonde's panicked face. He was mouthing something furiously at him, Merlin couldn't see what - the train was already a blur of motion and his stomach was heavy with dread. 

His wallet was in his bag. The directions to Gai's house. Everything important that he owned!

Merlin ran a hand through his tousled hair, fingers dragging down his face as he looked down to the brown leather briefcase on the floor by his feet. What the hell was he supposed to do now?


	3. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arthur and Merlin clash

"And how exactly did you come by his bag then Sir?"

Merlin's eyes narrowed as they flickered lightly over the uniform of the police officer standing in front of him, barring his path along the street who payed him absent attention, more than half of his attention taken with the burbling of his police radio clipped to his belt.

"He pushed me off a tube train, and I... grabbed it to stop myself falling off. That's how I came by it!"

Merlin had walked only a few meters down the street when he was accosted, having surfaced from the underground station after a lengthy and stressful conversation with a guy in a the ticket booth who had a Jamaican accent so thick that Merlin had to strain to understand every other word, and as a result had left him feeling remarkably young, and insulting; he was accutely aware that he was probably coming off racist when he had to ask the guy to repeat himself for the millionth time, while he explained that his bags were on the train and he was not, and that they had everything he owned in them, and he had to get them back, and the guy had he radioed ahead to the next few stations, but was doubtful they had enough station guards to do much about anything until the end of the day, or until someone on the train reported the bags suspicious and they could narrow down the carriage they were in. At least, that's what Merlin thought he said. After all, Merlin couldn't say precisely which train he'd left his bags on, and they were only three minutes apart. Was it the fifty eight, or the fifty five, or the fifty two that he'd got off of. And why had he got off it anyway?

"Okay Sir. Then why did you leave the station with it?"

"What?"

"They've got a perfectly good system for lost property, Sir."

Merlin shook his head, worry creasing into his frown. The jitters had started up and he knew this clean-shaven, muscular do-gooder had him pegged as untrustworthy already. "I don't know I... I didn't think. I'm trying to get my bags back. I was going to... find a number or something. How was I supposed to know he was going to come back for it?"

"He says he told you."

Incredulity washed over Merlin's face, and his chin jutted, lip curling just slightly as he looked around the bulk of the officer to where the smug blond git was standing with another guy in uniform, just enough distance away to be safe if he tried something. 

"Oh he did, did he? From inside the train while it was pulling away? Right. Sure. Of course he did."

"He says you were looking at him"

"Well he also seemed to think there was room for him to get on, so I don't think he's exactly a benchmark for sound judgement!"

The absolute wanker was trying to drop him in it. Assuming that he'd actually stolen his bag, when Merlin was the one who's just lost all his wordly possessions of any importance! How they'd actually managed to locate him, Merlin had no idea, until he caught the blond man's narrowed eye. 

"Lucky I had my Ipad's locator on, or he would have got away with some very important documents."

Merlin snapped. "I didn't steal your sodding briefcase!" His lunge closer to the man was pulled up short as the officer planted a very firm hand on his shoulder. "Oh get off me! This is ridiculous!" 

"Theft is a very serious matter, I'm afraid Sir. You're just arriving in London are you? We don't tolerate this kind of thing. Do you have a job lined up, do you? Somewhere to stay?"

Merlin's face reddened instantly, outrage and the insult of the implications flaring pure embarrassment through him. Did he look homeless? On drugs? Was it the soft cotton top he was wearing - faded and baggy? The fact that his jeans were ripped? The only thing keeping him from mangling his words into an incomprehensible stutter was the anger that the blond wanker had provoked in him in the first place. 

"If you're charging me with theft, then I'm charging him with assault."

"You're what?" 

Oh, so now Mr Fancy Suit wasn't too above him to speak to him. Funny that. Merlin's smile streaked across his face, waxing triumphant.

"You heard me. Assault. You pushed me off that train. There have to be half a dozen witnesses. And security cameras. Charge him."

The harried police officer let out a slow sigh, but to his credit, Merlin did note that his defensive posture had lessened. He'd stopped fronting up to him as though he was going to make his stab vest a necessity. 

"Look, guys, I want to get this sorted without taking the pair of you down to the station. Do you really want the trip to court?"

Another arrogant pout made an appearance and the blond shook his head, arms folded across his chest. Again Merlin had the feeling that the man thought he was something quite revolting. "Oh I really don't think that's going to be necessary, Officer."

"Good. Very sensible. Look - this gentleman admits his mistake, the young man gives you your bag back, along with an apology and -"

"No!"

"I am absolutely not admitting anything!" 

Disagreement with the officer was unanimous. 

"Do you know who my father is?"

Merlin scoffed a laugh, shaking his head. He'd never me someone who'd think to actually say that in real life. The police officer seemed similarly unimpressed, if his raised eyebrow way anything to go by. 

"Is it relevant to the current situation Sir?"

Total appoplexy - so that was what it looked like. Merlin thought the blond guy's head might explode. 

"Pendragon, Camm and Lot. The Law firm? Oh, thought you might have heard of them."

The officer's head tilted slightly, almost as though he was waiting for the punch line. Merlin hung back. 

"I don't think it would go down very well - you taking the word of a vagrant theif over the word of an upstanding lawyer, do you? Officer... what was your name? Sounds a lot like slander, doesn't it?"

The officer grimaced and turned to Merlin slowly, head wavering in a so-so kind of nod. 

"Without evidence of assault, I would strongly recommend dropping the alegations..."

Merlin blew out a disgusted breath over his teeth. "Oh, seriously? You're going to let him threaten you? I hav evidence; I told you there's evidence. Ok, so... assault, miscarriage of justice..." Merlin counted off his charges on his fingers, eyes sparkling dangerously. "Do you want to add anything else - go for the hatrick?"

Pendragon's eyes steeled. "He has no evidence."

Merlin's jaw rippled. "The guard on the platform is called Gil Karragh. He saw everything."

"Oh did he now?" The undoubtedly handsome man's face contorted with a sneer. 

"Yes. He did. Can you even practice law when you've been charged with assault?"

"Listen you little shit, you don't know who you're dealing with. The legal fees alone would cripple you."

"Oh _that'll_ look good when I go to the press."

Pendragon threw the first punch. How he got around the officer, Merlin didn't quite know. They likely hadn't been expecting the attack to come from him, but it did. Merlin's eyeball crunched, pain exploded along his cheekbone and he stumbled back before lunging forwards on an outraged snarl. Hand pinned him back, a whirl of dark blue uniform and hands and shouting. And oh, gods, this was not the way his first day here was supposed to go.

It took five minutes for a police van to arrive - five minutes of being shoved up against a wall with his hands pinned painfuly behind him and the full weight of Officer Dolan forcing his face against the damp brickwork. The pair of them were shoved unceremoniously into the back of the van with an order to behave and thankfully Pendragon had finally shut up. 

Another hour and a half later, the door to the holding cell opened and the disapproving figure of Pendragon Senior filled the space. Steely eyed, grey-haired and humourless - Merlin was very thankful he was no relation of his. Despite that fact, he found himself wanting to disappear from view. 

"Arthur. Explain to me why I've had to come down here? Explain to me why I've had to walk out of a meeting on the Project Triton accounts, a meeting which the client are paying for? And why I have spent the last half an hour talking to this young man's Uncle trying to convince him that you are not in fact a total sociopath."

The pout of Arthur's lips only increased and he shot a scathing glare at his cellmate, as though this whole thing was somehow his fault. "He-"

"Unless you have anything at all productive to add, you will shut your mouth Arthur."

"Uther," the man announced, turning abruptly away from his son and extending a hand in Merlin's direction. Merlin gave a shrug of a smile - much like one might offer to something that was likely going to eat you and gingerly shook. "I apologise for my son. They found your bags at the station, so I'm told. You're Uncle is waiting out the front; he tells me you have a good background in archiving and administration."

"Oh, right. Um. Yes?"

The man nodded. "Good." Out of the corner of his eye he saw Arthur's eyes narrow all over again, his head shaking from side to side in an almost begging motion.  
Merlin was soon to join him.

"This theft business can disappear, can't it? Arthur here thinks he needs a paralegal. After today I don't think he deserves one, so you'll do. He owes the firm... oh, lets see... two partners and a senior lawyer for... two hours? That's getting on for a million you wasted Aruthur and we won't be able to charge it back. Maybe your new friend here can help you with that. If not, I strongly suggest you start thinking of career options outside the family firm. Do I make myself clear? Merlin, I'll have a contract drawn up and sent over to your Uncle's house. My HR department will be happy to discuss salaries in the morning."  
He wasn't certain that refusal was an option.

"Arthur, come."

Merlin only breathed again when the pair of them had left the cell. His hands were still shaking when a vaguely familiar face peered around the edge of the open door. 

"For godsake boy, stop daydreaming!"

"Uncle Gai?"

Officer Donal dropped his bags down beside him and relief blossomed in Merlin's chest. "Oh you found them!"

"Oh Merlin. I for one do not want to spend the rest of my evening staring at the concrete walls of a police station, although I do have to say the toilets are decorated with some truely imaginative profanities... How's your mother? I did rather think you were supposed to be coming tomorrow... Oh well. You're here now, aren't you?" A gentle touch turned a little rougher, gripping his hair as he tilted his head to the light to inspect the damage Arthur had caused, fuzzy brows forging together. "Hm. Perhaps we won't tell her about this." The man landed a nearly scolding swat to his nose. "Well let's go! Come on then... Don't leave an old man standing around."

Merlin found himself hustled out into the cold evening, his head a whirl with all that had happened and all that was yet to come. The bruise on his face was throbbing and his eye was swelling shut. He hitched his bag higher onto his shoulder and tried not to think too hard about tomorrow. There had to be a way of getting out of such a ridiculous situation.

Right?


End file.
